Internet sides with woman who 'tricked' tardy mom for her birthday lunch
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: The Internet is siding with a woman after she revealed that she gave her mother the wrong time for an event so she would be on time, for once. The scenario was posted by u/punctualgirly in the popular Reddit group 'Am I The A**hole?', where it received 7.5K upvotes and close to 1000 comments.
In the Reddit post titled, "AITA for giving my mom the wrong start time for my birthday lunch so she'd be on time?," the Original Poster (OP), 22, started off by giving some background information on her mother. "My mom (mid 40' F) is one of those people who is always late to everything. I'm talking family get-togethers, birthdays, graduations, weddings, you name it she's showing up late. At first growing up I just thought it was because she's bad with time, but as I've gotten older I genuinely believe she likes making an entrance."
READ MORE
'Nothing ever changes'
OP shared how she found it "rude" and "embarrassing" and how her other family members have complained about this. "Nothing ever changes. It's gotten to the point that whenever my grandma has family lunches or dinners she'll tell my mom it starts an hour earlier that it actually does, so she'll be there on time. (My mom doesn't know that my grandma does this, it's a joke between grandma and I)," she said.
"This past weekend was my 22nd birthday. My grandma wanted to do a lunch for me at her place with our immediate family. The lunch was to start at 2pm, but we told my mom 1pm. I had plans later that evening to go out for dinner with my boyfriend, so I wanted to leave my grandma's house at around 5 the absolute latest because I needed to go home and get all ready," OP said.
'She arrived 2 and a half hours late'
She continued, "Well of course my mom was late. We called her at like 2:30PM to see where she was because you know, it's her daughters birthday. She had just left her house at 2:30PM and still had to pick up her bf on her way to my grandma's (30-35 mins away) so none of us were expecting her to arrive until like 3:30PM. She finally arrives 2 and a half hours late from the time we told her, makes her little entrance. We question her about. She tells us she thought the lunch started at 2? We asked her where she heard this from, she said my aunt (who was present at the lunch) told her. We questioned my aunt and she said she felt bad 'lying to my mom'. Everyone is pretty annoyed, but we all move on."
OP continued, "Fast forward an hour later (4:30PM) I have to start leaving. My mom starts getting all annoyed with me that I'm leaving 'so soon' and that she barely got to see me for my birthday. I told her that my life doesn't revolve around her, and that she should've been there sooner. She started giving me attitude and listing all these excuses as to why she's late. I couldn't be bothered to hear them and left. Later that night she messaged me saying that I was acting like an AH towards her and it was rude of me to lie to her about the time the lunch started. My mom and my aunt think I'm an AH for lying to her." She concluded the post, saying, "My grandma doesn't think it's a big deal and they're overacting. I came here for some outside opinions."
'She has no respect for other people's time'
Almost 1000 people left comments on the post, with all of them supporting OP. One user wrote, "NTA. But stop lying to her. Stop accommodating her. Don't hold up any events or dinner or lunch or anything for her. If she arrives to a meal or function and it's over and the food is either gone or put away, then it's 'Oh well, should have been here on time.' I would never hold up one more thing for her. She's rude and has no respect for other people's time."
Another agreed, adding, "And don't give her attention when she arrives. Stop that immediately. When she gets there give an, 'ah, you're here.' Then go back to the event and don't give her that satisfaction of 'omggg I'm here so sorry I'm late love love smooches smooches the traffic was so bad omg how are you ahahahaha'. When she comes barging in late, make a simple acknowledgment that she's there and then pretend like there's been no interruption. If she starts trying to make her scene, a simple, 'you're on time for your reputation, nothing unexpected. If you need to collect yourself, go ahead and do so. We'll be here when you're ready to join us.'"
A third shared their own experience with someone similar. "We did exactly this with my aunt who is late to everything. A few years ago she showed up 3 hours late for Christmas dinner. We had already eaten and were well into a few bottles of wine when she arrived. She was initially pretty angry but we all just stood firm, you live 20 minutes away and you knew what time dinner started. It's nobody's fault but your own that you missed dinner. We told her we saved her a plate and she could heat it up whenever she wanted to, but if she wanted to eat with the rest of us she should have showed up on time. Once she found out she won't be the center of attention by showing up late, she stopped doing it."
A frustrated user said, "This is a grown a** woman that raised a child. She is perfectly capable of being on time, but repeatedly chooses not to. She thinks her time matters, but no one else's does. That level of blatant disrespect and selfishness is embarrassing. No more lying about times, starting activities late, prolonging activities, or having any arguments about it. She's wasted more than enough of your life. NTA."
This article contains remarks made on the Internet by individual people and organizations. MEAWW cannot confirm them independently and does not support claims or opinions being made online.